Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Interesting revelation

But despite the success and a 57-percent drop in crime in the 1st District, plaintiffs' lawyer Glad Jones asked Perrin if he knew that, at that time, Meffert was telling Dell that he "would pull the video-surveillance system from the street if he could." Jones also asked if Perrin knew that St. Pierre was forming a company, NetMethods, to get into the crime-camera business.

That's big. How can they prove he was telling them that? Do they have that in a deposition? If Meffert told Dell he would pull the existing cameras off the poles...cameras that the city had already paid for....wow.

Tangentially, that really pisses me off. Not only was he abusing his position, he was prepared to piss away all the city's money he had already spent on the existing system so he could get in the action with Dell....nice.

Strippers and then Chuck E. Cheese, man. How'd you like it if that were your Dad? The guy is a raging egomaniac.

He does not care if he is hurting his own wife and kids, so why would he care about you and your tax dollars, huh?

Why would he care about all the people his behavior is hurting? Only his needs and his potential hurts count. (Nagin with his oreo cookies and his self-description as a "warrior" is like this too.)

Meffert is a 'kombinator'. That's the old Yiddish word for an "operator".

I like my elderly Uncle's way of saying it better, because his word evokes the image of someone always trying to find the combination:

What words or little gestures will get the girl to sleep with him? What will get him out of trouble this time? What will give him an extra one percent or ten percent on a deal?

Everyone else is understood in only terms of how they facilitate his interests; everything and everyone is merely an instrumentality.

As soon as a person or a deal stops being the most ego-gratifying option, he's on to the next. So screw taxpayers and their tax dollars, man.

From what we've seen, I'd bet even his friends are not really his friends. He'd throw them under a bus, too, if he thought it was in his best interests. "I did what I needed to do to survive." Yeah, bra. Whatevah.